Professional Conduct Committee Decisions

ARCHITECTS REGISTRATION BOARD

PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT COMMITTEE

IN THE MATTER OF

GILLIAN BECKINGHAM (052383F)

on

7 April 2009

Cliffords Inn Conference Centre
Fetter Lane
London EC4A 1LD

Present:

Chairman: Peter Verdin
PCC Member: Barbara Saunders
PCC Member: James Cuthbertson

Mr Stephen Battersby appeared as Clerk to the Committee

Mr Iain Miller of Bevan Brittan appeared on behalf of the Board

Ms Beckingham did not attend the hearing and was not represented

CHARGE

The charge is that the architect was convicted of breaching section 7 of the Health & Safety at Work Act 1974 on 31 July 2006 at Preston Crown Court, which is of material relevance to her fitness to practice as an architect.

DECISION

CHAIRMAN:  This has been a sad case. The conviction of Ms Beckingham resulted from what was at the time the most serious outbreak of Legionnaires disease in which seven people lost their lives and very many others have suffered serious damage to their health.

We have had the opportunity of reading the sentencing remarks of the judge and it is perhaps helpful to refer to one paragraph of his remarks:

“Gillian Beckingham, in any judgment your failings were repeated and serious. But for the context in which your failings occurred, but for the lack of support you received from the local authority for which you worked, but for the general ethos, as I see it, the general regard or disregard had to health and safety the result of this trial might have been very different. But fail you did. You failed in respect of a matter which was liable to lead to multiple deaths, and did lead to multiple deaths, and to multiple and very serious suffering.”

The judge was conscious of the failings of the defendant but he also appeared to be conscious of the lack of support given to Ms Beckingham and the failings of others – which did not appear to have resulted in prosecution even though from the documents presented to us certain tasks appear to have been subcontracted.

Ms Beckingham has already suffered a penalty from the court and it is not our task to punish her again. Our position as a regulatory body is defined in the case of Bolton v Law Society (1994), which describes the case of a solicitor but can be aptly replaced with an architect

“It is important that there should be full understanding of the reasons why the tribunal makes order which might otherwise seem harsh. One is to be sure that the offender does not have the opportunity to repeat the offence. This purpose is achieved for a limited period by an order of suspension; plainly it is hoped that experience of suspension will make the offender meticulous in his future compliance with the required standards. The second purpose is the most fundamental of all: to maintain the reputation of the solicitors’ profession as one in which each member, of whatever standing, may be trusted to the ends of the earth. To maintain this reputation and sustain public confidence in the integrity of the profession it is often necessary that those guilty of serious lapses are not only expelled but denied re-admission. A profession’s most valuable asset is its collective reputation and the confidence which that inspires.”

We are therefore conscious of the twin duties of protecting the public and the need to sustain public confidence in the integrity of the profession of an architect.

Ms Beckingham’s health has suffered; the latest psychiatric report available to us from 2007 refers to a post traumatic stress disorder. She and those who have written on her behalf feel that she was not the one with prime responsibility for these tragic events. Nevertheless it is not for us to go behind the conviction, although this view is reflected in the judge’s sentencing remarks.

We have considered suspension but Section 17 of the Architects Act 1997 provides that suspension ends after a period of two years. We are aware of Ms Beckingham’s health problems. We hope that she makes a good recovery and that she will be able to return to practice at some time in the future. But we do not know when that will be. We have to be sure that she is restored to health before she returns to the Register and the only way we can do this is to order erasure.

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